From the Site: QUOTABLE "The one thing when I came to Portland, no matter how bad we had a first quarter, second quarter, or any quarter, there’s always a new quarter and new time. You have to be smarter on decisions and I think Dame helped me out with that a lot." -- Jusuf Nurkić
Currently, I wouldn't make any changes. The Blazers are playing solid basketball and all of the recent losses were close ones against good teams. Last night's game was very impressive, Utah is a good to great team at home and the Blazers overcame both a hot run by the Jazz in the third that would have folded Blazers teams in the past, plus the shrugged off a heroic final quarter from Mitchell. If that Aaron Gordon trade became available, I would really be hesitant to say no, but the team looks very dangerous RIGHT NOW. A week or a month could change things, we all know that, but I wouldn't do anything to screw up the flow the team has now.
We are significantly better. Ranked from least to most significant: We are using ET better. He needs the ball. Good passer, liability off the ball. Curry makes our bench better. Aminu is better (by far most underrated Blazer, starter quality player, fans undervalue defense, high IQ yup I mean it) Jake has arrived with promise and hope (love the way he plays, quick, hustle, always on the move, back door savant). Dame is better (every year) Nurk is much better (mostly offensively, FT%, passing, even defense which was already elite, we lucked into Nurk big time) We are playing though Nurk (duh). Stotts was always a good coach. People are just impatient and blow up when we lose.
